Duplicate and multiply - desktop copiers - Canon's PC-330L, Sharp's Z-88, Xerox Corp.'s 5310 - Includes related article on copier maintenance

Home Office Computing, Dec, 1993 by Daniel Grotta

It's Friday, and you're making your weekly pilgrimage to the local copy center to photocopy all the invoices you've received, charges you're billing, proposals you're pitching, and incoming correspondence that needs to be filed in triplicate. So much for the paperless office. You sigh and consider that maybe it's finally time to get a copier.

The question is, what kind? Just as the three most-important things to consider when buying real estate are location, location, and location, the three most-important qualifies to think about when choosing a copier are volume, volume, and volume. You need to know how many copies, on average, you will be making each month, and you need to match that volume to a unit that can safely crank them out without stressing the machinery--this is known as the duty cycle.

Most small-business owners with copiers produce a few hundred copies a month. If that sounds like you, that puts you in line for one of two types of desktop copiers: a featherweight machine that produces four to six copies per minute and a midrange copier that cranks out 10 to 12 copies per minute. Typically, machines in these categories have duty cycles ranging from 200 to 1,200 copies, although the Xerox 5310 we review here boasts a duty cycle of 1,500 copies per month.

You shouldn't worry about the physical integrity of the machine if you sometimes have to produce more copies in a month than the system is actually rated for. Most manufacturers' duty cycle ratings are ultra-conservative, and the true figure is usually double or even triple the stated number. But you should be concerned with how many copies you crank out in one session. Desktop copiers aren't designed to cram an entire month's duty cycle into a single session or even a couple of days, unless you want to turn your machine into jelly.

Just as important, if you regularly produce more than 500 copies a month, a desktop copier--even one with a duty cycle rating well above that figure-- may not be the most economical choice over the long run. In that situation, an office copier--with a duty cycle rating that can be as high as 60,000 copies a month might be the better buy. The reason is that feather-weight and midsize desktop copiers, which have low initial purchase list prices (about $400 to $1,800), use convenient but relatively expensive drum and toner cartridges that have to be replaced more frequently. Office copiers like the 32-cpm (copies per minute) Sharp 8500 initially cost much more (from $4,000 to $8,500; the Sharp 8500, for example, lists for $5,795.) but they use long-life drums and replenish toner less frequently from inexpensive bottles or tubes. On average, the cost per page will be three to five times greater on desktop copiers than it is on office machines. So if you use a desktop copier to regularly make more than 500 copies a month, you will have spent enough extra money in 12 to 18 months to have paid for an office copier and received the benefit of its faster performance and enhanced features set.

BUYING CONSIDERATIONS

In this review, we look at three new desktop copiers from Canon, Sharp, and Xerox that are designed to satisfy the range of small-business copying needs, from low-volume usage to somewhat heavier copy duties. We evaluated these three machines with real-life tests: how long it took us to set them up; how easy they were to operate; whether they were prone to jamming; and the quality of their output. We also tested the copiers to see how they were able to hold up to stresses beyond their official duty cycle ratings.

While the diminutive six-cpm Canon PC 330L is discounted below the cost of the other two units ($599 versus $800 for the Sharp Z-88 and $999 for the Xerox 5310, both 10-cpm systems), it can cost slightly more to operate-up to five cents per page. Per-page costs for the Sharp and Xerox top out at about four cents. These costs factor in electricity and the possibility that the companies' toner-life estimates are generally optimistic. (We did not receive Canon's two older 10-cpm systems, the $1,795 PC-11 and $1,895 PC-12, for this review.)

But the advantages of a featherweight, six-cpm copier like the Canon PC 330L are sufficient to make it worth considering. Of course, the low upfront cost is a draw, as is the fact that it is so small and lightweight that it can be easily transported in a regular suitcase. That makes it ideal when you need to make copies offsite. The slower speed can, however, make bigger copying jobs frustrating, and it lacks some special features mid-range competitors offer (for example, the PC 330L does not support originals larger than 8.5 by 14). While copiers like the PC 330L are small and compact, the copy board moves across the length of the machine when it scans the page to be copied; that may prevent it from being placed in a confined space. Most midrange copiers have fixed copy boards, and therefore do not have this problem.

Midrange desktop copiers like the Sharp Z-88 and Xerox 5310 are often equipped with built-in extras like reduce/enlarge controls and the ability to print using different color toner cartridges. The enlargement and reduction capability is worth the extra cost, especially if you need to copy oversize pages onto standard-size paper. Except for automatic exposure (which sets the correct degree of contrast for maximum image quality and is found on all three systems reviewed here), pass up most accessories-like duplexing--that promise automatic operations. Only businesses that depend heavily upon a large volume of photocopies really need this level of automation--in which case, a sturdier office copier is probably the better choice, anyway.